she
by sparklingplum
Summary: a prince and his princess. not a fairy tale. i/r
1. Chapter 1

**she**

* * *

i.

"I'm not a child, treat me like a man."

"Say that to me when I'm not bathing you."

Ichigo pauses, appears to think, then says objectively, "I kissed you last night."

 _Rukia trails her hands up his chest and encircles her arms around his neck. She lets him hold her tight and welcomes his warm lips. In her arms, he's not a prince. In his arms, she's not his maid._

"I kissed you last night," he repeats, more objectively. Like it will strengthen his choice of argument for the day.

Rukia barely glances at him and says nothing.

He has his arm and hand extended to where she is. Rukia holds it, carefully lathering it with soap. His long fingers curl and uncurl in her touch. His is large, calloused, uneven and scarred. This is not a pampered prince's hand.

Then he catches hers, caressing it in pressed touch, mutely telling her things.

She glances back at him, as if reprimanding him, he holds her stare and wordlessly pleads with her, _'let me, please.'_ She lets him.

He insists on calling for her during morning baths -many times- incorrigible like a child. This action incites a castle-wide albeit _hushed_ rumor about her and him; that the ambitious maid is whoring herself to the prince.

He is immersed in a gold and white bath tub. There are sheets drawn all around them, trying to block the all-too bright sunshine _and others_.

 _It's a private matter_ , he says.

She sits on a stool beside him, her clothes are drenched and she acts as his bath attendant, despite all the other fitting servants meant for the job. He said it's the only time he can talk to her in private, _just don't think, just don't think about the nasty rumors_ –he reassures her.

She faces him, he tells her to. He said he likes looking at her. She complies because she said it's to get the work done easier.

She could burn fairy tales. She could burn tales about fairies and princesses and godmothers and evil witches because they make things look easy. She could burn fairy tales. Because if there is a single wish she's free to make, _it's not this_.

Both of them settle for silence this time. He leans back and closes his eyes, still holding her hand tight.

Rukia sits there and listens to his breathing. Tomorrow, he'll go back to the frontlines.

* * *

ii.

The first time his hair –bright as the sun, orange-y like the freshest orange juice- blinded her irises was when he decided that the storage cabin where they keep their week's supply of fresh fruits was better, as in better, more comfortable than his bedroom.

before.

Rukia is uncomplaining and reliable and honest. So the task of collecting breakfast fruits falls as one of her duties. She collects everything; pineapples and coconut butter and strawberry jams. The head maid –which is rude, rud _er_ , rud _est_ \- trusts no one but her, because the other castle urchins dressed as maids will simply go: _let's steal all these_! but not her.

This particular early morning, when no birds fly, and the sun is barely out, and the rain from last night turned the soil into mud overnight, she descends from the white marbles steps of the castle into the inch-deep mud towards the farm patch, and to the storage, carrying her basket.

The place is well-stocked for the whole week –farmers harvest and their wives stack. So as expected, the rows of basketful fruits are there ready for her and the scents, honeyed, sometimes sour because of the pickled fruits, and a fresh tang reach her nose, and she wonders, what would she get?

She begins to move around. She thinks peaches and mangoes and dried melons-

Not oranges.

His hair –bright as the sun, orange-y like the freshest orange juice- blinds her irises, and stops her on track.

 _A man_. She stammers, "a man!" unthinkably.

Rukia quickly recovers from her shock and hides behind a shelf of baskets. _Is her voice too loud? What if he wakes up?_

One peek, another peek. A man. Sprawled in between shelves of basket, his head sticking out, with his limbs and clothes in whirlwind disarray, and naked chest –she suppose she should blush, but she doesn't - _can't_ blush at the situation.

What is he? A thieving bastard?

The kitchen knife! –she thinks frantically- good thing she has it with her.

* * *

iii.

The first time her short stature stunned him –oh? So being _that_ short was indeed possible?- was when she thought it was a nice idea to wander around early in the morning stealing fruits from the castle storage room.

before.

Before, his eight-year old self said, looking at the knights leaving the castle gates to defend against the decades-old siege their enemies have been laying, "I'll die bravely, I'll be like a blaze of bloody glory."

Now he says, "I'll die bravely, I'll be a blaze of bloody glory." Nothing changed except for a small detail. There's a hard certainty there; he's a man now, big and strong and powerful –there is now truth in his words.

These days, he tells his dream with a little more conviction and a little less boyhood undertone. He recites, no longer in front of his mother or father or court people, to please, that he has this obligatory drive to win, he recites, in front of his men, less prince-ly, more warrior, a little bit king-ly because that's what their current foes expect and he knows they meant blood.

The prince has a single goal in his mind: always always always fight for his people.

So the prince has no commitment; no parades, only the sun or moon reflecting his blade. No court parties, only the mud in his horse's hooves. No women, only the screams of his enemies before decapitation.

So he trains. He trains because he wants to go out with a bang, a sword piercing his heart, wild like a whirlwind, limbs flailing, blood spraying, victory light in his shoulders and he thinks that's glory.

The rain is heavy and the soil is beginning to soften. The prince still stands –trains- outside, farther in the courtyard, where the castle storage is, concealed by trees, where music does not reach him and silk bedding doesn't matter.

The rain is heavy and it's midnight and he still trains, not tired, not exhausted. The rain is heavy and he enters the fruit storage because he suddenly wants to consume something. The rain is heavy and he thinks of resting for a bit because a good warrior understands balance, so he sits beside baskets of peaches, mangoes and melons.

He hears the fading sound of the rain, and then he hears nothing.


	2. Chapter 2

**she**

iv.

She's tied. Tied in a wooden post, like a hog on the eve of a festival night.

"You imbecile!"

"Right," he yawns and stretches in front of her, twirling her knife in his palms, "says the one tied like a hog." Then he smirks and she thinks he looks awful and smirking and unruly and wild (and how dare he wear nothing in front of a maiden?) and what is he doing here anyway? And such a thieving idiot-

"-the fuck are you?" he says slowly and pulls an empty fruit crate, turns it upside down and sits on it right in front of her, he holds the knife in her left cheek as if to threaten her.

She stares ahead, glares directly at him, (kind of averting her eyes from his bare chest because it's unladylike even for a poor maid like her) "I am from the castle and you are trespassing-"

" _Right_ ," he cuts her off and actually smirks and, " _fuck that_ , I own these."

His head tilts _–these, bitch_.

 _Oh the nerve_! Rukia is quick to fire back, "nonsense!" and there's no proof, "you are delusional," then, "you think the castle guards won't catch you, you shameless thieving bastard?"

He laughs, loud and masculine and mocking, not charming and melodious like any prince should, oh, he is a shameless thieving bastard.

"I'm sure they won't," he says confidently, because what guard would be stupid enough to arrest a prince? And what –he glances at her- _maid_ would be stupid enough to reprimand him-

"Silence!"

-and shout at him?

She glares deeper and holds her chin higher, and he thinks she is ignorant but pompous. She isn't that pretty-

"Untie me," she orders him, her voice like a teenage boy trying to sound adult.

"No fucking way," he answers cooling and he maintains the knife grazing her cheek and he likes it that she isn't flinching and all girly and screaming and her eyes are abnormally purple and bright.

v.

The concept of the gossip had been simple, really: a boy and a girl and a tryst.

But the complication of the gossip is this: a prince and a maid and arriving early in the morning at the castle –which of course, points to the question: _where have they gone during the night_?

And the reality of the gossip is this: a smirking prince, a maid he carries in one arm like a sack, and both emerging out of the fruit storage house, bickering and wrangling and quarreling about freesias and fruits and thievery and broken bones resulting to a very compromising and suspiciously hushed pseudo-wrestling behind the bushes where the other kitchen maids have awkwardly (and excitedly and invidiously) found them.

(unfortunately for the prince and the maid, they did not know that they were being watched. But more unfortunately for the maid, she did not know that she's beating the prince and accusing him of thievery)

And so the result of the gossip directly takes after the complication of the gossip: the maid is ambitious, and what a poor prince.

(the concept was nothing remarkable, if it was done in a small village where a story of merriment and tryst and young intimacy is as common as wildflowers)

There is something all the castle maids definitely agree to –aside from pretty taffeta ball gowns and pleasant cherry-berry pies and charming high-birth men- that the prince is dashing. A fine man, and really strong, and deserves a woman of high-birth as well –just like any prince should, just like any fairy tale would.

.

.

.

"Get up," Rukia says quietly and steps away from the tub and takes the towel to rinse him. She just finished scrubbing his arms and hands (softly tracing and remembering the scars in them). She's drenched from middle down, her sleeves pulled up to her elbows, and the whole room smells entirely of freesia and fruits.

She turns back and expects him to be standing and grinning at her inappropriately, but instead, she finds him dozing, his head relaxed on one side, his naked body half-immersed in water and bubbles –one of the few times she's seen him so peaceful and calm. (the usual Ichigo glares like blood and speaks like a sword and his arsenal and the way he carries himself –a battlefield echoing a cemetery)

Rukia sighs, it's very typical of him to make her job harder, delays here and disruption there. Arrogant and petty and demanding when she first met him at the storage room, and when she actually learned that he's the prince, _well_ , he was extra arrogant and extra petty and extra demanding.

But still, the warm sunlight directly illuminates him, and the balcony doors are open and it's just so easy not to think of tomorrow.

Today, the morning sun is out; the sky is swirling peach and white and blue, and there's the greenness of the forestry and damp grayness of the stones and the sound of the roosters and horses and the collective laugh of people going about their everyday duties –perhaps, a good day today, Rukia lets Ichigo sleep a little more.

vi.

Somewhere in the castle, that little wretched maid sleeps peacefully, Ichigo thinks.

.

.

.

(the storage room did not end well for the both of them; the little bitch gutted him with a punch _after_ tearing the cloth he tied her with and ran around the storage room screaming _thief_ and hurling fruits and crates at him; and he – no – he did not do anything straightforwardly unpleasant other than scream curses at her until he caught her and carried her like a sack of potatoes and brought their little wrestling tirade outside that ended with him escaping from her)

Such a handful, this little bitch –Ichigo thinks irritably, _standing_ beside her bed, the moon shining overhead.


End file.
